Organizers are seeking donations for scholarships

Sep. 26, 2012

Vance students play with shadow puppets, inspired by a teaching artist who did stories with puppets. / Special to WNC Parent

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More about THE PROGRAM

ACDL-AS offers elementary programs from 2:30-5:30 p.m. on school days at Claxton, Hall Fletcher, and Vance elementary schools. ACDL also works with Asheville Middle School students. Two-, three- and five-day enrollment is open to all elementary students and scholarships are available. To enroll, sponsor a child, or find out how your school can become a host school, visit www.ashevillecommunitydesignlab.com.

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For Chris Joyell, executive director of Asheville Design Center, the center’s after-school programs are more than an opportunity to teach students. It’s an opportunity to develop “young community advocates,” he said.

Asheville Community Design Lab After-School (ACDL-AS) is an interdisciplinary, project-driven curriculum focused on finding collective solutions to community problems through creative experimentation.

Elementary school students connect with community mentors such as artists, designers and engineers during “Innovation Hour,” and students engage in hands-on projects often related to a larger community need.

This school year, ACDL-AS is at Claxton, Hall Fletcher, and Vance elementary schools. ACDL also works with Asheville Middle School students.

ACDL is a program of Roots + Wings School of Art, based at All Souls Cathedral in Biltmore Village and the design lab at Randolph Learning Center, in partnership with the Asheville Design Center. It began as a partnership with “irl,” In Real Life, an Asheville City Schools Foundation after-school program that connects middle schoolers with UNC Asheville students.

Organizers are now seeking donations to expand the program’s reach; ACDL-AS donates one scholarship for every 12 students that sign up.

“We have 40 elementary students enrolled in our program for this fall with seven on ACDL-AS scholarships,” Huebner said. “A few local businesses have stepped up to donate between $130 and $300 per month to sponsor a student, and we still have 15 more students in need of financial support.”

It costs $325 each month for a student to attend ACDL-AS five days a week. ACDL-AS pays artist educators and gives a portion of the profits back to host elementary schools’ parent-teacher organizations.

Joyell stresses that the program is designed to help compensate for classroom curriculum shifts that have moved away from “programming that allows children to expand their mind.”

“We want to give them challenges and show how they can be a critical piece” in finding solutions, he said, noting that the wants children to be able to experiment and have the time and support to rework solutions if they fail.

One example: The after-school program is working on designing an outdoor learning environment at Hall Fletcher Elementary. While they teach students about vaulted domes and weather stations, organizers will seek their input on the design.

At a recent after-school session, Huebner “walked in and it was such a great feeling,” she said.

The three-hour program began with a snack, followed by physical activity outside. Then the students gathered for the “Innovation Hour.”

“That’s when we focus on offering kids diverse choices,” she said. That day, students could learn how to weave; another wrote a story for shadow puppets. Another group stayed outside, focusing on yoga or a soccer skills session. After Innovation Hour, the students are encouraged to work on homework or continue projects.

“There is some structure, but there is some freedom where they can decide from options,” Huebner said. “That’s where growth comes in, even for adults.”